


Retrograde

by OhUna



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, Gen, Introspection, Slow Build
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-22
Updated: 2016-08-22
Packaged: 2018-08-10 08:41:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7838077
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OhUna/pseuds/OhUna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which we explore another point of divergence from canon where Beth walks out of Grady without getting shot. A re-imagining of what the series would have been like with Beth alive. We'll focus on character development, the Beth/Daryl dynamics, what  it even means to "be good" in TWD, and all the fun that comes with peering into Beth's and Daryl's heads.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Retrograde

**Author's Note:**

> Hey folks! I haven't written fanfiction in years, but (as many of you can relate) the Daryl/Beth dynamic was too alluring to not explore. So here's my returning foray into the world of fanfiction. This is a multi-chapter WIP, with ETAs of about a month between chapters (I'm slow--sorry all!). I hope ya'll enjoy reading this first installment as much as I had writing it. Cheers.
> 
> Retrograde: having or being motion in a direction contrary to that of the general motion of similar bodies (Merriam-Webster). Also the title of an amazing James Blake song which inspired the content and even the pace of this fic.

The evil of the old world, the world before the turn, was petty, clumsy, and heavy-handed. It created things like bureaucratic labyrinths, economic crises, and political stalemates. It also seemed to be holing up as a long-term patient at Grady Memorial Hospital. Daryl could smell it in the stale perfume of bleach, bodily fluid, and sponge-bathed flesh. Could see it in Carol’s hunched form and every tight stitch on Beth’s face. He could hear it in the pressured, terse tones of _that cop_ (Daryl couldn’t remember her name, didn’t matter really matter) as she made one last desperate power play.

“Now I just need Noah.”

Her words caused Daryl’s simmering anger to flare in disbelief.

She had some fucking nerve.

He clenched his teeth, his jaw muscles absorbing the brunt of his anger as his eyes flicked from Rick to the woman officer. He watched Beth run tearfully up to Noah and mentally shook himself. Keep a clear head Dixon. The stakes in this sick game of chicken were too high to be reckless and let anger take hold.

Although that woman seemed bullishly oblivious to the stakes.

Or worse—she didn’t seem to care. Hell, she was getting _off_ on it. She pinned Noah with a smug knowing look as Beth embraced him good bye.

“I knew you’d be back.”

Her soft words pulled the tension in the hallway taut, until it snapped back into a pin point centered wholly on Beth Greene. Daryl watched her blonde head slowly pull away from Noah. She looked up at the woman officer, and her eyes were electric.

And oh, Daryl knew that look. He knew that crackling tension pulsing just below the quiet of her wide, unblinking eyes. The breathless milliseconds before her stillness would shatter into rapid motion—he imagined her hand flying up to flip him off, eyes flashing with emotion and lightning, voice raw as she delivered some brutal truth right to the gut. She would move fast, hit hard, and where it hurt. In this situation, that look was like to get her killed.

He shadowed her movements, passing Rick as he stepped forward with every step Beth took towards the woman officer.

Then Daryl felt something strange.

For the briefest of seconds, the sounds of the hallway faded to a muffled din and he experienced a niggling in the back of his head. Like the brush of cosmic fingers pulling back the edge of a curtain that separated now from what could be—the ghost of a gunshot, a spray of pale blonde hair and blood, his heart and stomach plummeting, flatlining into a rivulet of red across old linoleum. Suddenly Beth was not just gone, she was _dead_. And he was never going to experience her gentle smile, her flashflood anger, her farm girl good-sense—he was never going to look into her big blue eyes ever again.

Then the curtain dropped.

Daryl bit back a strangled sound as he sought to regain his bearings. _I’ll be gone someday._ Nope. Not today--He knew that look in Beth’s eyes. He wasn’t gonna let that happen.

 _Now_. He had to act _now_ or regret it forever.

He took another step, “ _Beth_.”

His voice was insistent, her name a harsh, staccato bark. Beth jumped, startled perhaps by that same strange shift in the universe he felt.

The woman officer swung and trained her gun on his face. The gun was steady in her hands, but her raised eyebrows belied that it was a knee-jerk response. She hadn’t meant to do that.

There was a moment where he felt the tension spike. Then a ripple of clicks and the rush of metal swinging through the air, and now everyone had raised and cocked their guns at one another.

Great. A full-blown Mexican standoff.

The corner of his lips curled into a minute snarl as he kept his eyes locked with the woman officer’s. A fleck of panic was growing in her eyes and she finally seemed to realized that she had now boxed them _all_ into a corner. Dumb ass.  

The silence stretched on for too long, the hallway suddenly suffocating, the lighting made everything look flat and sideways—something had to give. Someone had to squeeze the trigger. Daryl wished he could reach for his gun.

But the tension didn’t crash in a hail of bullets, adrenaline, and regrets. Instead it abruptly exhaled into the sound of a woman’s voice, nervous but determined--

“Enough. Stand down! This has gone on long enough.”

It was the other woman cop, the one they had taken hostage. She held her arms outward, as if to push back the officers poised behind her.

“Shut i—“

“ _No_ , Dawn _.”_ Her voice shook, but she dropped the “Ma’am,” the respectful reference to the woman’s rank. She then threw a forceful look over her shoulder, “I said stand down. This is just about her.”  

The truth proved to be a compelling out for the cops.

One by one they slowly, miraculously, lowered their guns until it was just the woman officer, Dawn, who had her gun drawn. Now she was the only one backed into a corner. She looked as if she had gotten slapped in the face. Her head didn’t reel back, but there was shock, anger. Something then tensed and tightened in her eyes, and she lowered the gun from Daryl’s face. He could see her finger trembling over the trigger. It was a gesture of barely-restrained surrender. 

“Just go,” their former hostage part ordered, part pleaded from behind Dawn.

Without a gun in his face, Daryl felt comfortable glancing back to meet Rick’s eyes. The man had a calculating look, like always. He was weighing options—leave? Would these people continue to be a threat? Should they kill them all? Daryl’s gaze flicked over to Beth’s tense shoulders then back to Rick as he gave a near imperceptible shake of his head.

_It ain’t worth it—we need to get our people safe._

Rick’s eyes made the same sweep from Beth, to Noah, back to his own. He saw him give a decided nod, while aloud he simply said,

“Yeah.”

In his periphery, Daryl saw Noah tentatively inching towards their group. Without looking away from the cops, he carefully reached over and ushered Noah back. He then tugged on Beth’s elbow and hazarded a glance down at her when she didn’t move right away.

She was regarding Dawn with wide eyes, her expression serious. The officer was watching Noah’s retreating form, but like Rick her face was guarded and calculating—he could see her already devising ways to reverse the shift of power they had just witnessed. Beth must have seen that too, because her lips suddenly pressed into a thin, grim line. He pulled more firmly on her elbow. _It ain’t worth it. We need to get you safe._

Beth glanced up at him then. She allowed him to guide her away first by her elbow, then with a hand flat on her back. When they reached the double doors leading out of that god awful hallway, she looked back one last time—a last solemn sweep over those nervously shifting officers, Dawn’s rigid form—and then turned away.

As they hurried out of the hospital, Daryl kept his hand on the small dip between Beth’s shoulder blades. In part to guide the group from behind, in part as an anchor amidst the surge of relief that suddenly shuddered through him. They were lucky. They had been teetering wildly on the edge of tragedy, he had felt it. Yet to have been pulled back, to have everyone alive, to be able to retreat to safety—they were so damn lucky.

He pressed more firmly against Beth’s back. She was warm under his hand, and it was enough for now to ward off the chill of all he could have lost.  

***** 

After they had met up with the others, they decided to head up to Virginia to reunite Noah with his family. Maybe they were still flush with their luck at the hospital and wanted to give him the same exuberant, tearful reunion that Beth had with Maggie. Or maybe they needed the hope of a new place to be since D.C. was a bust, and Georgia seemed teeming with ghosts and regrets. Daryl didn’t know. Either way, they all piled into their white van and quickly put as much distance as they could between them and Atlanta.

That was hours ago. Cool daylight had given way to inky night, and the air had a bite to it now.

They set up camp on a patch of dirt just off the side of the road, and built a too-small fire behind the vehicle. The flames cast everyone in shades of orange and shadow as they all huddled together, devouring roasted squirrel and spoonfuls of canned beans. The air hummed with low murmurs of conversation, and laughter, and the musical scraping of silverware on tin. It was as if the world had heaved a sigh of contentment, and it had fallen gently over their family like fresh-washed sheets on a bed.

It was all too much for Daryl. After hastily eating his fill, he retreated to lean against the rear bumper of the van and observe the group from the fringes.  

He needed to get his shit together. His stomach and some hollow place in his chest were a frenzy of relief, disbelief, giddy knots of emotion, and this pulsing firefly glow. It had started when they were driving away from Atlanta and he had glanced in the rear view and saw everyone, all together and alive. And it came to an overwhelming peak when they had pulled over to set up camp.

Everyone else had clambered out of the van. He had slid out of the passenger side just in time to hold Beth steady as she maneuvered out of her seat.

“I can get out fine on my own, you know,” she had arched a brow at him even as she took his arm.

A beat, then—

“I know.”

His response had been low and serious, and her fingers on his forearm had twitched before freezing. He hadn’t planned to say it, but he met her curious look with an intent stare because he needed her to understand that he meant it. He knew she was tough, that she coulda and had gotten out of plenty of rough spots, that she was strong—he regretted not telling her sooner.

Much like that night at the funeral home, understanding had blossomed suddenly in her eyes. But this time a surprised little smile quirked the corner of her lips. The firefly glow in his chest had suddenly burst and expanded to fill his lungs and cheeks with warmth, while something fluttered and curled in his stomach.

Oh _._ He had been so focused on getting her back, he hadn’t really thought of what would happen after they were reunited. Sure. Around a mouthful of cloth and hovering over a trough in Terminus he had realized that, yeah, he could have spent the rest of his days with her at that funeral home.

So yeah, she was _somethin_ to him. Somewhere between the moonshine fights and confessions, wheeling days of wilderness, crossbow training, and funeral home squatting, she had become _somethin_. He didn’t know what exactly, but it was good—too good to think about in her absence, too good to lose.

But he hadn’t lost her, and she was here now—he felt the heat from each of her digits pressed against his bare arm. 

It had been too much. They’d looked away at the same time, and he had wordlessly helped her down and out of the van before hurrying away to string their make-shift can alarm around the perimeter of the camp.

“We got real lucky with her.”

Rick’s voice broke through his musings, and Daryl felt the van give as Rick joined him in leaning against the rear bumper. He fished a cinnamon stick from his pocket and grunted in agreement. He was only slightly surprised that Rick’s words echoed his own earlier thoughts about the incident at Grady.

 “Least we all got out,” he added. He ignored the long stare Rick was giving him and clenched the cinnamon stick between his teeth.

The man finally looked away, and shook his head.

“No. No, that was too close. We can’t afford to depend on luck anymore.” Rick shifted, crossed his arms, “Next time we’ll do it different.”

He slanted Rick a look, “You think they’ll be a next time?”

“Yeah. We’ll try not to let it, but… There will always be people around, and people are the real danger now.”

Daryl thoughtfully toyed with the cinnamon stick in his mouth. He knew what Rick meant, and to some extent he agreed. Of all the dangers in this new world, it was people who had really screwed them over. And yet—his gaze drifted back to camp. Tara was setting up a blanket for Noah to sleep on, while Rosita was lounging against her backpack as she chatted with them both. A bit away, he could make out the shadowy outlines of Sasha and Tyrese, already asleep. Meanwhile Beth was still up and sitting by the fire. She was sandwiched tight between Maggie and Carl, and was extending her arms out to take Judith from Carol.

He watched Beth toss her head back to smile playfully at the lil ass-kicker in her lap. The fire brushed a golden hue to her pale hair, and made the stitches on her face look deeper and darker. She looked down, her expression gentle and tender, and bent to press soft kisses to chubby cheeks behind the curtain of her hair. Daryl quietly tucked the image away in his memory.

_There’s still good people, Daryl._

 “We’re people.” He turned to face Rick, “We’re good people, and we’ve made it.”

Rick gave him another hard stare, “And we’re dangerous too.”

Daryl paused, struck now by a contrasting image of Rick right after he had bit Joe’s jugular and before he approached the man trying to violate his son. He remembered Rick’s mouth and beard soaked in blood, his eyes narrowed with a wild and deadly gleam. It was a raw moment, one of fierce love and cruelty, madness stretching the limits of morality. And he knew Rick was right—good didn’t necessarily mean safe anymore.

Hell, he still wasn’t sure he knew what it meant to be “good.”

The sobering realization quieted the riot of emotions he had been experiencing since leaving Atlanta, although that firefly glow continued to pulse deep in his chest. He turned away from Rick, and together they resumed watching their people from afar.

***** 

After several hours, the peaceful hum of evening dinner had quieted to a hush broken only by the soft sighs and snores of their sleeping camp. Daryl had offered to take first watch, and was perched on the roof of the van, his legs hanging over the back.

His eyes swept over the sleeping figures on the ground, arranged in a circle with various weapons at the center and within arm’s reach. They had to off only one walker the entire evening, and that combined with the happy glow of their reunion seemed to make sleeping easier for everyone. He could even hear Rick, for all his gruff misgivings and cynicism of earlier, breathing slow and deep from within the van where he slept with Judith on his chest.

Beth was wide awake though.

She was trying to be quiet, but he could hear her carefully shifting positions every couple of minutes from where she lay on the ground. Despite coaxing from Rick and Maggie, she had insisted on sleeping outside. She gave a soft huff and flung her good arm back to couch her head, lying flat on her back in apparent surrender to sleeplessness.

He cleared his throat, and she abruptly sat up.

He watched her slowly push herself off the ground, and pick her away around their sleeping companions towards where he sat. In the dim glow of the dying fire she was a slip of a silhouette—long slender torso, flared hips, and (he was pleased she still remembered) the measured, silent steps of a tracker.

When she reached the back of the van she looked up at him. Her face was impassive, but her eyes were expectant. He held their gazes together for a second more, then gave a small jerk of his head. _C’mon then._

Despite her cast, she was able to scramble up the metal rungs on the van’s reardoors. She winced as the van swayed with the motion of her settling next to him on the dusty roof. Daryl heard Judith give a small whimper, but then all fell quiet again.

She reached over and gave his wrist a small squeeze before letting go and turning to look into the night. They slid into an easy silence, and at least an hour passed before Beth finally spoke. 

 “I missed this.”

He hummed and picked at the strap of his crossbow, “Missed what? The squirrels for dinner or sleepin in the dirt?”

She wasn’t baited by his teasing, “I missed just bein like this—with you and everyone. And bein able to see the stars. It’s been a while since I could just look at them.”

Her voice was hushed and distant, and he tilted a look at her from the corner of his eye. She sat cross-legged to his left, and was leaning back on her cast-free hand to peer upwards at the night sky.

Daryl could feel her knee grazing against his leg, and he realized that he hadn’t looked at her this close since the funeral home. Her earlier tossing and turning had pulled her hair loose from its ponytail, and the frizzy fly-aways were a pale blonde backdrop to her profile. She looked gaunt, and he wondered if they even fed her at the damn hospital. Or maybe it was just the sleep-deprived shadows smudged under her eyes. Or was it the strange, quiet tension she now carried that was carving new angles into her face?

His gaze traveled up to the rough-hewn stitches curved above her brow. The sight caused his stomach to lurch, and it reminded him of earlier that day, when it felt as if the whole universe was lurching and heaving towards a sad, untimely end.

He turned his head to fully face her, his voice taking on a grave, rumbling timbre,

“What were you plannin to do, back at the hospital?”

He saw Beth stiffen, but she didn’t seem surprised or confused by his question. She knew what he was asking. The van creaked as she swung her legs out from under her so they could hang off the side of the roof, and angled herself towards him. Her gaze was turned inward, inscrutable.

Then, she carefully slid out a pair of medical scissors from within her cast. She set the scissors down in the small space between them, and looked Daryl straight in the eyes. Her voice was calm and clear, her gaze steady.

“I was goin to stab her in the neck.”

Daryl’s eyes narrowed and his mouth twisted to the side, but he remained silent. Waited for her to continue.

“I know it seems reckless, but it wasn’t. I was definitely angry, but I knew what I was doin—knew what I _had_ to do,” she paused, her eyes lowering to contemplate the scissors as she weighed her next words.

“I understood then. Whichever way it went, it had to be either her or me—It was the only way to settle it. The only way you could all get out safe.”

Daryl flinched as her words sunk in. Her voice held flinty resolve, a distant sadness, and the last shadow of her girlhood slipping away into the ugliness of this new world. It all made his chest hurt. Because god, she was beautiful. This woman, with her steely grace and fighter’s scars. And she could have just as easily been dead than talking to him now.   

“Beth,” her name came out a mournful whisper and he paused, cleared his throat, “You shouldn’ta—That wasn’t— It wasn’t on you to do that.”

She frowned and shook her head, “But it _was._ I did what you or any one of us would do in that kind of a situation. It was on me ‘cause I _care_ for you all…and I knew I could get you safe.”

He watched her shift, and she turned pensive.

“I guess,” she said slowly, “danger is part of caring for people now too. Maybe that’s how you know you have somethin to live for.”

Beth’s gaze suddenly swept up to tangle with his.

A few years ago Daryl was working an odd-job, and the transmission of the piece of shit pickup he was driving had failed as he was racing against a massive summer storm. He was stuck in that humid truck for hours, rain rolling metallic against the roof like snare drums. Through ribbons of smoke from his cigarette, he had watched fingers of lightening streak sideways across the sky and illuminate the clouds like fireworks, like a flashbomb of daylight. And he had been filled to brimming with awe and aching, and the lonely knowledge that this beautiful powerful moment would only ever be his.

That’s how Daryl felt now with Beth looking up at him. He was witnessing some profound shift in her, and in them, and in what it meant to _live_ and not just survive. It was quiet and subtle and just between them and just in that moment. And somehow that made it feel even more powerful than a lightning storm.

He suddenly wanted to pull her closer, as if to preserve this moment between the press of her against his side like flowers between the pages of a heavy book.

It was too much. He dropped his gaze, and only looked back at her from behind the safety of lowered lids and his hair. He chewed on the inside of his cheek.  

 “I’m okay Daryl,” her voice was firm but warm, and she gently nudged him with her leg, “I’m okay. I got this, all right?”

He was relieved she didn’t push it.

He felt a jolt like a splash of ice water as he became acutely aware that he and Beth were not actually alone. They had either talked softly or whispered the entire time, but he suspected they had woken up Rick. If not Rick, he was pretty damn sure at least one other person had managed to shake off sleep and was listening to them.

His eyes flitted to Beth, who was still looking expectantly at him.

“All right then Greene,” he heaved a pained sigh, slipped his crossbow strap off over his head, and placed his crossbow on to her lap.

“What are you doin?”

“Well, since you got this and all, why don’t you go’on and take the last part of my watch.”

He rolled his neck and then reclined on to his back, his right hand behind his head. There was a pause, and he glanced up at her.

Daryl thought she might be amused or even annoyed. Instead, she had that same careful, speculative look she would get when it was just them two and he would casually touch her elbow or press a hand to the small of her back. It was the same yet different, because now there was also a searching _knowing_ crinkle in her eyes and a slight curve to her lips.

“Still remember how to use that thing?” He drawled, motioning at his crossbow with his chin, “Try to keep the pointy end facing away from you.”

Beth huffed a little and rolled her eyes at him, and he gave her a wry part-smile before looking up at the stars.

For a few minutes they sat in silence.

“Just—just try to keep pullin those kind of stunts to a minimum okay?”

He didn’t know what he was asking exactly, but she seemed to. She didn’t turn to him, didn’t reply. But from the corner of his eye he saw her profile soften into a small, sweet smile, and he heard the scrape of her cast against the van roof as she slid her hand over and laced her fingers through his. 

Daryl stifled his own smile, and closed his eyes. There were still a lot of question he had for her. Like what happened to her outside the funeral home? What did they do for her to get those stitches, that cast? What happened to give her that haunted look in her eyes? –but those chilling questions could wait.

For now, he focused on the warmth of her small calloused fingers curled against his own. This was good. They would be good.


End file.
